Sunday, September 04, 2016

Sukata Judo and Dan Grading

When I got my 1st Dan
in Judo 10 years ago it was still classed as an accomplishment.

In one day you had to do tge full Gokyu left AND right
handed, if you passed that then it was Katame-No-Kata AND Nage-No-Kata
COMPLETE. If you passed that you had to complete a line up against 4 other
Judoka going for the same grade; you had to win ALL fights by IPPON, any lower
score resulted in you not getting the grade and having to do it all again.

Thats when being a
Dan Grade meant something. Now you can "earn" a Grade over years, one
section of Katame-No-Kata!!

Top of Form

Bottom of
Form

This article was on Facebook and I found it very interesting
let me tell you a little bit about my 1st Dan Grading:

I started Judo at the age of 5 in 1955 under the direction
of my Father Nobby Clarke and Mother Margret Clarke both who gained their 1st
Dan in 1962 examiner Kenshiro Abbe 8th Dan. There was very little
junior Judo in the 1950’s hence the reason my Mother and Father started the
Young Judo Club Sittingbourne in 1957 one of the first clubs to cater for
Children. My father would organise some of the first junior Judo competitions
in the area during the 1960’s. The junior judoka in those days were not of the
standard of today and neither did they have the numbers. Many clubs did not
have proper Judo mats our own club started with old feather mattresses with
heavy canvas. I loved competition and at 13 was training with adults. My first major
tournament win was at the BJC Open in 1967 held at Maidstone where as a 1st
kyu I won the Heavyweight Brown Belt section and then won the Open where I beat
all the Dan grades.

Why have I told you this simply this would lead to me
getting my 1st Dan in 1971. Being young and conceited I loved the
idea of being a Brown belt and beating Black Belts was a great rush but was to
create many arguments with my parents who tried to explain that Judo was more
then winning a competition and embarrassing Dan grades. Eventually my father
told me if I did not take my Dan grading I would be banned from the club,
needless to say I took my grading. The competition side was no problem BUT the
theory side i.e. Kata was alien to me. Yet when I received my 1st
Dan I began to understand Judo and by 1974 I was a 4th Dan

My 1st Dan grading was with the BJC (MAC) and all candidates
were expected to attend 2 weekend courses at Elliott’s J C Rochester normally
organised by Bob White, which covered Nage No Kata, Refereeing and Theory the 3rd
weekend would be the Southern Area Grading at YMCA Maidstone where there would
be literally hundreds of Judoka. I had to take a line up of 10 Judoka who were
1st Kyu and 1st Dan, which I won all of them.

At the time I did question whether the Examiners were
expecting more from the Candidates then they had achieved themselves? A few
examiners do sometimes make a grading exceptional hard so they can enhance
their own reputation.

In the International Budo Federation UK we still expect
certain standards for Competitive Judoka i.e. Good standard of Shiai, Nage no
Kata, Gokyo, Counters & Combinations we no longer do Line Ups for two
reasons we no longer have the numbers and secondly Line Up do not judge a
players competitive ability it only judges a players stamina and always favours
the bigger Judoka. The IBF also recognises that not all Judoka wish to or able
to compete so we do organise Non Competitive Examinations but I can not
remember the last time we have done this for 1st Dan but as Judokas
with years of experience do they take this examination route and to be honest
these are the judoka who keep Judo alive by running clubs etc.

What we have to realise Times have changed back in the
1960’s and 1970’s the main Grappling/Martial Art was Judo with a little bit of
Karate and Jiu Jitsu, now we have hundreds of different Martial/Grappling Arts.
It obvious that many Martial/Grappling Artists no longer want to be thrown like
we do in Judo and Sambo so we have to adapt. The late Great Geoff Gleeson used
to attend Sittingbourne and would give courses and one thing he said was that
we should cater for as many people who want to do Judo as possible so if need
be we should concentrate on aspects of Judo which different people want.
Working on this basis I recently spoke to one of my senior Dan Grades and said
if people do not want to box they learn boxersize why can we in Judo not do the
same and develop a section where no one get thrown but can be used an exercise,
balance plus learn how to work in partnership and the obvious answer for this
would be the Ju No Kata. I have asked him to start a Ju No Kata Club